Even as they face calls for reform, Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools board members face a fundamental question in the Beren Academy controversy: whether to discipline Beren for a rules violation or to let the matter slide, the group's executive director said Monday.

Edd Burleson, executive director of TAPPS, said the board could meet next month to consider action against Beren over its failure to withdraw from the state basketball tournament. The Orthodox Jewish day school's participation in the tournament led to a scheduling crisis and calls for TAPPS reforms.

Burleson said he is dealing with those issues while also acknowledging accusations that he and TAPPS discriminate based on matters of faith and religious practice.

“We're not faring well in the court of public opinion,” Burleson said. “Absolutely not. No one likes to be perceived as being an anti-Semite or prejudiced or bigoted — all the words that have been cast my way. ... And I do not believe I am any of those things.”

The Beren brouhaha erupted last month when the school was expelled from the tournament because it could not observe its Sabbath and play in a Friday semifinal. When players' parents filed suit, TAPPS rescheduled the game. Beren lost in the state final.

Criticism of TAPPS continued after the tournament. A group of Catholic high schools suggested it could reconsider membership. TAPPS met last week for member schools to comment on policies and set a second meeting for this month.

For now, the focus is on Burleson, who has been executive director of TAPPS for more than a decade. Asked last week by The Dallas Morning News what he would have done differently in the Beren case, he said, “We shouldn't have accepted them in the first place.”

Burleson said Monday that he regretted the scheduling controversy but didn't feel Beren should have been excluded because of its theology. He reiterated that Beren generated the potential for conflict when it did not withdraw, as required under TAPPS regulations, even though it knew it could not play Friday and Saturday playoff games and keep its Sabbath observances.

Rabbi Harry Sinoff, Beren's head of school, said he hopes Beren will remain part of a “broad and inclusive” TAPPS.

“TAPPS is at a watershed moment. There are heads of schools pushing in one direction, and I presume there are heads of schools pushing in another direction,” Sinoff said. “Inclusivity is not an absolute. We are a Jewish school — we are exclusive. But what I hear from most of the heads of school like ours is the school is exclusive, but they want the association of schools to be inclusive.”

Burleson acknowledged that expulsion or penalties against Beren would only increase the heat on TAPPS.

“The board has tried to let this thing cool down so that any decision can be made, but at some point they will have to do that,” Burleson said. “They will have to follow through with some review of this and take action, or they will simply ignore it.”

He said a decision could be delayed while TAPPS submits this survey to its members:

• “Do you want TAPPS to accept any private or parochial school as long as it meets the criteria of at least four grades in high school with at least 20 students, has some background in interscholastic competition and is recommended by at least three schools?”

• “If you agree to admit any and all schools, do we accommodate their individual needs based on religion or any other exception to the rules?”

• “If the membership agrees to inclusion and accommodation, will your school accept without question that your games may have to be moved to a different time, date and location, and can you be supportive of this rather than being a dividing force?”